God Is in the Crowd

July 1, 2018
A meaningful attempt to answer a significant question: How can Judaism survive?In his first book, financier and former Israeli combat pilot Keinan reflects on a lifetime of varied experiences with his Jewish identity, providing a heartfelt, well-reasoned reflection on the Jewish people. Raised in a thoroughly secularized Jewish family, the author first engaged with Judaism as a source of identity as a student at Phillips Exeter Academy in the mid-1980s. Later, he moved to Israel and joined the elite Israeli Air Force. After experiencing both American and Israeli Jewish communities, Keinan was led to reflect on the existential issues facing the global Jewish population and to search for answers to the problems facing it. The author deftly describes unsustainable splits in the Jewish communities of Israel; as he terms them, these include Secularists, Theocrats, Territorialists, and the Fourth Israel (often poor and undereducated citizens with little connection to religious and political controversies). According to Keinan, these groups live as separate populations that fundamentally disagree on everything from what it means to be Jewish to the very purpose or legitimacy of the Jewish state. Meanwhile, in America, intermarriage and ambiguity regarding the identity of Judaism continue to lead to a decrease in the Jewish population, a decrease that the author believes will be catastrophic in scope within a few decades. Keinan goes on to search out answers for Jewish viability, drawing on crowd wisdom theory to determine what has kept Judaism alive through diaspora and exploring such intriguing options as a Jewish World Endowment or a strengthened Israeli presidency. As a secular Jew, the author mostly discounts the religious aspects of Jewish identity, and his scorn for ultra-Orthodox Judaism, one of the only growing segments of Judaism, is often evident. But Keinan never promises a perfectly balanced book. Instead, he provides an impassioned yet well-reasoned and definitively well-written reflection on an imperiled people.A thoughtful and relevant assessment of the current state of Judaism.

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July 23, 2018
American-Israeli entrepreneur Keinan, chairman of Koret Israel Economic Development Fund, pulls no punches in this strident assessment of the future of Judaism, but his proposed solutions are ultimately unrealistic. Keinan builds on current research into negative demographic trends for Judaism and makes use of his own experiences in the Israeli Air Force to highlight serious internal divides in Israeli society that threaten stability. With the world’s dwindling Jewish population concentrated in the U.S. and Israel, he is afraid the “wisdom of crowds” that helped to constantly redefine Judaism by welcoming a diversity of theological interpretations will soon come to an end. The essence of his points will be familiar to readers already engaged with the topic, but the book’s true novelty lies in Keinan’s admittedly radical proposals for change. He suggests moving away from the monopoly on Judaism exerted by the Israeli rabbinate and establishing a “president of world Jewry,” as well as creating a Jewish world endowment to fund basic Jewish educational and cultural opportunities for children—though neither of these comes across as particularly realistic. His final suggestion, that technology “may prove a superior medium for establishing and maintaining a coherent Jewish communal voice,” is similarly aspirational and underdeveloped. Keinan’s passion for the topic and his desire to advance the discussion are commendable, but his ideas for radical reinvention are unconvincing.

September 15, 2018
Keinan has written a book that is part memoir and part prescription as he examines, in depth, the present condition and prospective future of Judaism in both the U.S. and Israel. He writes from the perspective of an American-born Israeli entrepreneur and the first non-Israeli-born person ever to have served in the elite Israeli Air Force. Indeed, he draws on his years as a pilot to illustrate many of his points. In his examination of present-day Israel, he identifies four minority factions fighting to define Jewish statehood: the Territorialists; the Theocrats, with whom he generally disagrees; the Secularists, with whom he identifies; and what he calls the Fourth Israel, whose constituents have to struggle for economic survival. In his wide-ranging?and sometimes meandering?book, the author also examines the schism between Israel and the United States, proposes a dramatic expansion of the duties of Israel's president, and applies the wisdom of the crowd to his investigation. Sure to be controversial, the book invites thought and discussion to an essential end: the very survival of Judaism.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)